A facile one step route that introduces functionality to polymer powders for laser sintering

Krumins, Eduards; Crawford, Liam A.; Rogers, David M.; Machado, Fabricio; Taresco, Vincenzo; East, Mark; Irving, Samuel H.; Fowler, Harriet R.; Jiang, Long; Starr, Nichola; Parmenter, Christopher D.J.; Kortsen, Kristoffer; Cuzzucoli Crucitti, Valentina; Avery, Simon V.; Tuck, Christopher J.; Howdle, Steven M.

Abstract

Laser Sintering (LS) is a type of Additive Manufacturing (AM) exploiting laser processing of polymeric particles to produce 3D objects. Because of its ease of processability and thermo-physical properties, polyamide-12 (PA-12) represents ~95% of the polymeric materials used in LS. This constrains the functionality of the items produced, including limited available colours. Moreover, PA-12 objects tend to biofoul in wet environments. Therefore, a key challenge is to develop an inexpensive route to introduce desirable functionality to PA-12. We report a facile, clean, and scalable approach to modification of PA-12, exploiting supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) and free radical polymerizations to yield functionalised PA-12 materials. These can be easily printed using commercial apparatus. We demonstrate the potential by creating coloured PA-12 materials and show that the same approach can be utilized to create anti-biofouling objects. Our approach to functionalise materials could open significant new applications for AM.

Citation

Krumins, E., Crawford, L. A., Rogers, D. M., Machado, F., Taresco, V., East, M., Irving, S. H., Fowler, H. R., Jiang, L., Starr, N., Parmenter, C. D., Kortsen, K., Cuzzucoli Crucitti, V., Avery, S. V., Tuck, C. J., & Howdle, S. M. (2024). A facile one step route that introduces functionality to polymer powders for laser sintering. Nature Communications, 15(1), Article 3137. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-47376-4

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 28, 2024
• Online Publication Date: Apr 11, 2024
• Publication Date: 2024
• Deposit Date: Apr 16, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 18, 2024
• Journal: Nature Communications
• Electronic ISSN: 2041-1723
• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 15
• Issue: 1
• Article Number: 3137
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-47376-4
• Keywords: Organic molecules in materials science; Polymers
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/33567173
• Publisher URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-47376-4